Effective Scrutiny

September 2002 – September 2004

Principal Investigators: Mark Sandford and Lucinda
Maer

About the Project

The Constitution Unit carried out a two-year programme of research into
effective scrutiny at all levels of government in the UK. The research began in
September 2002 following the securing of funding from the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation.

The level of interest in scrutiny, by parliamentary, assembly, and council
committees, has grown exponentially since 1997. The task of scrutiny has been
allocated to elected representatives in every new government body created by the
Labour Government. There was, however, no systematic attempt by the Government
to clarify what scrutiny was, how it should be carried out, or what results it
should produce.

There is a considerable literature on Parliamentary committees, dealing
mainly with their influence on legislation; and, since the introduction of
scrutiny committees in local government by the 2000 Local Government Act, a
number of explanatory guides have been produced for local authorities. However,
the devolved institutions, the Greater London Authority and the Regional
Chambers, and Parliamentary committees (when dealing with policy issues) have
escaped much attention. Moreover, there has been no attempt to relate the
scrutiny processes in the different levels of government to one another: to
examine whether aims, processes, and lessons of scrutiny processes can be
transferred between different levels of government.

The project focused on committee scrutiny. The work of auditors, links with
freedom of information and issues around judicial accountability were not
studied.